During the meeting at FAO’s Rome headquarters, the Director-General called for Mozambique’s support for food security efforts in African Portuguese-Speaking Countries (PALOP), where FAO is already providing a regional Technical Cooperation Programme.

Graziano da Silva informed about FAO’s support for the approval of the Law on Agriculture and Food Security and Nutrition by Mozambique’s parliament in 2014 and also briefed her on FAO’s work to promote smallholders at the Ninth Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization, which will be held in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2013.

Maria Da Luz Dai Guebuza, who has been the First Lady of the Republic of Mozambique since her husband President Armando Emílio Guebuza took office in 2005, underlined that FAO’s help in fighting malnutrition in children and pregnant women was vital.

The First Lady called for FAO’s support to help decrease post-harvest losses in Mozambique at the food processing, storage and conservation stages, particularly for easily perishable fruit and vegetables, and to improve irrigation technology in the country.

Da Silva mentioned that Mozambique is one of five countries in which FAO is already developing a Purchase from Africans for Africa Programme, a south-south cooperation initiative executed by FAO, WFP in five African countries. The PAA links smallholder farmers to local institutional markets, in particular school meal programmes, enabling farmers to become more involved in producing and marketing food, while helping to supplement and diversify diets.